The Clock Chime
by Smidy
Summary: Boo Radley, Pre Novel: In his head, a wild battle was raging.


_AN: I like Boo Radley. We had to do a Creative Piece for Year 10 Lit and here's mine. Hope it's ok :)_

* * *

It was dim, always dim.

He sat rigidly in a dilapidated, moth-eaten arm chair in the living room, its brown fluffy innards spilling out as if a star in a B-grade horror movie.

His knees were bent, and his hands were placed perfectly on his knees, forearms resting against his sinewy thighs. His back was straight and his head aloft, wide, skittish eyes darting this way and that, surveying the walls and furniture, ears straining for any slight sound of movement.

His eyes scanned the wall in front of him, a perfectly rendered surface with an aesthetically pleasing rich cream gloss of paint, not a mark to be seen or a blemish to be recorded. There was a grand piano in the corner, its majestic mahogany shining in the moonlight, and a dresser, his mother's special plates and favourite vase resting on its face, all devoid of any trace of dust.

A few metres to the right of him, a couch sat silently, navy blue, as dark as the night and pillows that looked as if they would mould wonderfully around him if he were to sit on them.

But he couldn't.

The floor was hardwood and, as with the rest of the house, was spotless, having to endure his mother's obsessive cleaning habits daily. It seemed to stretch on forever, a deep brown polished sea twisting through the doorway and turning into what he knew to be the kitchen.

For a moment, his chair was a ship, and he the captain, courageously following this path to his eventual freedom, but then he realised he was run aground, his vessel residing on a sheet of ugly plastic, there to protect his mother's floor from the devastation of scratches.

Crestfallen he slumped back in the chair, his light feathery hair flopping over his face and his eyes closing in apparent defeat.

A clock chimed somewhere.

Instinctively, he sat bolt upright, head whipping around to check every corner of his prison, fingers fidgeting incessantly and his breathing erratic.

Everything turned evil.

The wall he was facing seemed to be teetering dangerously toward him, as if ready to crumble at any moment.

The grand piano in the corner leered at him, the garishly white keys twisting into a snarl, the rustic, bronzed candle holders pointed at him, illuminating him in the dark.

The dresser stood menacingly, as if documenting his every move, or worse, scheming to damage his mother's favourite vase and plates and wrest the blame and consequences on himself.

The couch was sneaking up on him, stealthily moving inch by inch, and he could imagine it lifting up its pillows and unwillingly dragging him into the depths of the inky blackness, no knowledge of which way was up, effectively blind for the duration of his being.

The once comforting hardwood floor changed its visage to quicksand, and he was sinking. He let out a gasp of terror and launched himself off the chair, not registering the sturdiness of the floor or maintained original distance of the couch and flung himself from the room.

He sprinted manically down the corridor, took the second door on the left, ran one stride across his tiny room and threw himself on the bed. He gathered the tattered blanket around his thin frame and pressed himself nervously into the wall. He warily eyed the doorframe for a few minutes before deciding he was safe and settled down for the night. He lay on his back and stared at the ceiling, mentally vowing to himself that he would cease his midnight vigils, especially if all the upholstery and furniture were plotting against him like that. But then he remembered that he had promised the same thing the night before.

* * *

He decided he must've fallen asleep, because the next thing he knew, feeble rays of sunlight were peering through his tightly shuttered blinds. He shuddered and rose, slinking around the shards of light, revelling in the shadowy corners of his room.

He hated daylight.

Daylight showed things.

He didn't want to be shown.

He loved the night.

The night concealed things.

He deserved to be concealed.

That's what his father said and his father was right. His father was a good man. He had saved him from living in a horrible prison of nightmares masquerading as an industrial school and had kept him home and safe from the perils and evil of the outside world. He had told him and explained how when he was nineteen, his friends wanted just to use him and his fun was only guilty, sinful pleasures that only uncouth, un-gentlemanly barbarians partake in. His father hated uncouth, un-gentlemanly barbarians with an unbridled passion, so, as did he. He had once been such a man, his father divulged one evening. He had let out a gasp of disbelief. He loved his father and yet he had disgraced him by becoming the one thing he most rightly despised. He hated that. He hated barbarians. He hated himself. Profiting from this, his father had then proceeded to change his past, dropping well timed and well-structured phrases to greater intensify his guilt and consequently distort his earlier life with his father's own thoughts and prejudices. Soon, it was impossible for him to remember the times before his court case with his own mind, his father's deep, authoritative voice forever speaking in the far reaches of his conscience, changing things, erasing things, creating things.

* * *

And so, he grew, he aged and he believed.

He slipped into the routine set forth by his father and maintained by his mother quite easily.

Each day he would rouse himself from his dreams and take a bath. Then he would say good morning to his mother and farewell to his father and after, he would take a book, sit in his armchair and read. When he father returned, he would stand, say good day, mention how glad he was that he completed his journey to the shops with safety, and then retire to his armchair again to continue with whatever book he was currently consuming himself with. When the time came for each meal, he would rise and set the table; counting it a great honour that his father trusted himself with such a job and the family would eat, before he returned to his armchair yet again. He tried not to touch anything, as he understood that he was not to be trusted with any part of the house bar the bathroom, his chair at the table, his armchair and his room. Then, after dinner, he was taken outside by his father and given an hour or two to himself, free to roam the confines of the backyard and do whatever he pleased.

He liked to lie in the grass and watch the stars. They twinkled and winked and told him secrets.

At 9 0'clock every night, his father would then collect him and send him to bed, to which he would go willingly, anticipating a much needed 3 hour doze before his midnight vigil commenced.

* * *

One day however, mere weeks from his 34th birthday, his parents realised that he was getting restless.

Though not a fast reader of any sort, he had recently exhausted their extensive supply of books, having completed each volume at least ten times. They desperately needed another distraction and they needed it with haste. They believed that without an adequate passive hobby, all their hard work in controlling him would become unravelled and insignificant, both of them too old to start again and too uncaring to desire to. This was why, when his mother suggested that he start a scrapbook of local events from the Maycomb Tribune, his father did not protest. Endeavouring to isolate him from the outside world lest it conflict with his teachings of it, his father was faced with an excruciatingly difficult decision. He chose to ignore his qualms though; quite convinced that such was his son's state that individual thought was entirely unethical.

So, it was through the ink stained pages of the Maycomb Tribune on the 30th of October that he chartered his first individual foray into the outside world in fifteen years. He had gratefully accepted the day's paper form his reluctant father and carried it daintily across the living room floor to his chair. There, he gingerly turned page after page, keen eyes scouting for any interesting account or picture.

At first he was unsuccessful, every page consisting of meaningless town gossip, store advertising and church times. He was meandering slowly through the farming section when a name caught his eye. "Cunningham achieves fortune" it read; cheerful, cursive script adjacent to a medium sized photo of a man of around his age beaming, arm around his beautiful wife, children frolicking in the extensive grounds behind. Something stirred deep in his subconscious and he slightly narrowed his eyes, fingers reaching up to trace the visible contours of the man's face.

He knew him.

He was a man with a jovial, boyish grin and laughing eyes and strangely, his appearance triggered the unusual remembrance of dancing, drinking and outhouses. Utterly bewildered, he scanned the article below, searching for any clue, any hint as to why the bizarre images were recalled.

Then, there it was.

"Cunningham, previously known for involvement in Maycomb's infamous gang of young hooligans that confined Mr. Connor to the dingy surrounds of the court-house outhouse for an extended period of time, now admits that the ruling the court handed down as punishment for that crime was a gift from the Lord, his time at the industrial state school proving as an introduction into the incredibly wealthy business that has so earned him his majestic lot. "I also met my lovely wife here whilst on a job, an' now we have some lovely chillun and a lovely life." Cunningham proclaimed proudly, "We 'ave freedom and lotsa money to boot!"

He didn't understand.

He clamped his eyes shut and furiously rubbed his hands over them, willing the treacherous paper to vaporise into thin air. He peeked through his fingers.

It hadn't.

He tried to focus, but images kept flashing through his head. Blurry, faded images, but clear nonetheless. His father's condemning silence. His captivity. His monotony. His betrayal. He huffed out a large breath and desperately attempted to calm his mind, turning once again to newspaper lying in his lap. One sentence glared out at him. "When asked about the other men in his old group, Cunningham divulged that, "All of us went to the same school. We all got the same education and the same success. 'Cept for old Arthur Radley. Dunno where he went. Got the wrong end of the stick but if ya ask me."

He stared in disbelief.

He sat silently and still for a few moments, but was then startlingly aware of a smothering heat radiating in his toes. Slowly, it crept up his legs, through his torso, across his chest and straight down to the tips of each finger. He retrieved the pair of scissors he had brought and held them in his clenched fist, shaking uncontrollably. He let out a cry of disdain that sent his father running into the room.

In his head, a wild battle was raging.

An unfamiliar impulsive brash voice fought passionately against his father's calming, toneless one. He felt he was being tugged equally brutally by both combatants, and he was panicking, his breath escaping in short, shallow puffs.

His father glared at him, "Listen boy," he said, "that's enough racket outta you. You're mother and I are trying to relax and we can't bloody well do it if you keep whingin' and puffin' like you are."

He snapped.

Drawing the scissors back behind his head, he forcefully brought them down onto his father's thigh, relishing at the grunt of surprise and pain elicted from the older man.

His father stood frozen, terror contorting his face, and he slowly dragged the scissors out from his father's thigh, wiped them calmly on his trousers, and continued his perusal of the newspaper. Silence descended. His mother ran in, an infernal scream escaping her as she witnessed the blood gushing from her husband's wound.

"What have you done?" she breathed.

His father still hadn't moved.

"I'm scrap booking, Ma," came his quiet reply.

She ran for the phone.

* * *

The next few hours were a blur of blue, red and black.

The Sheriff visited, as did Dr. Reynolds, both purposefully avoiding his immediate presence. He heard something about jail, about full cells and about collecting tomorrow but he couldn't be sure. His mother refused to speak to him, his father refused to acknowledge him and soon, the crowd in the living room dissipated and he was alone in the dark.

He sat rigidly in his dilapidated, moth-eaten arm chair in the living room, its brown fluffy innards spilling out as if a star in a B-grade horror movie. His knees were bent, and his hands were placed perfectly on his knees, forearms resting against his sinewy thighs. His back was straight and his head aloft, wide, skittish eyes darting this way and that, surveying the walls and furniture, ears straining for any slight sound of movement. His eyes scanned the wall in front of him, a perfectly rendered surface with an aesthetically pleasing rich cream gloss of paint, not a mark to be seen or a blemish to be recorded. There was a grand piano in the corner, its majestic mahogany shining in the moonlight, and a dresser, his mother's special plates and favourite vase resting on its face, all devoid of any trace of dust. A few metres to the right of him, a couch sat silently, navy blue, as dark as the night and pillows that looked as if they would mould wonderfully around him if he were to sit on them.

But he still couldn't.

A clock chimed somewhere.

He shut his eyes and then opened them.

Everything didn't turn evil.

He breathed.

It was the same.

But it was different.


End file.
